Rev Nettleton, not “Down a silver mine”

A little while ago I wrote about “Minor Miracles“. I followed up with a little more research in the same place and found this from the clergyman I’m interested in:

THE Rev. Joseph Nettleton recently addressed a meeting of scholars on missions in Fiji, and described one of the chiefs who had seventy or eighty wives. The chairman catechised the children, and asked how many wives a man ought to have. ” One, sir,” was the ready answer. ” Now,” said he, ” I always teaoh youto give a Scripture reason for all your answers. Can you give me any text to show that a manought only to have one wife?” There was a long pause, and a little boy stretched out his hand. ” Well, my boy, I thought some one could give a passage of Scripture. What is it !””Please, sir, ‘ No man can serve two masters.’ ”

Now I wouldn’t call that the funniest thing I’ve ever read (or even heard from the pulpit), but there is something touching about reading something like that which is over 130 years old.

By the way, because of an accident in the way the text has been subdivided, the story about Nettleton is attached at the bottom of another unrelated piece called “Down a silver mine”! (the other article is interesting, but nothing to do with my project)